They coat the roads ahead of time with some kind of nasty brine spray. I believe it does far more damage than the rock salt, but I've got no facts to back that up.
What's really annoying is that some municipalities often don't even drop the plow down until there's over an inch or two of snow on the ground. They just put down more salt. Not with a dedicated salt spreader truck mind you, just the normal plow trucks, but the plow is only along for the ride.
They do that religiously here too, in the land of no rust. Moreso each year as the number of drivers increases and the number of HORRIBLE drivers increase at an even faster rate!
Hell, was driving into seattle a few days ago. Sun shining, cold out, roads dry as a bone, in the SRT. Couldn’t figure out why I was getting pelted with invisible sand, until I passed a few more cars and saw a DOT truck just laying the salt down!
Difference here is they coat the roads with brine or salt like mad when it’s not raining because 80% of the drivers here are too fcking stupid or to foreign to understand that humidity and dew point can make a little frost.
And on cold dry winter mornings you see cars in the ditch from just a little slippery spots overnight.
The reason it doesn’t rot out the vehicles here on the wet side is the other 90+% of days from Oct thru April it is wet or raining so any daily driven vehicle gets 100+ free undercarriage washes every winter!
